Building
Learners
Project

4

Responses

1. Ron says September 1st, 2008 at 8:41 pm
   

   Hi jbeam,

   The workBench won’t create and manage tables the way Word does, and you can’t bring a Word table as such directly into a workBench screen. However, there are some interesting alternatives that people have used.

   In order to pick out which ones make the most sense for you, could you give me a little more information. Do you want the students to use the workBench to input the data or simply to be able to see it after they give it to you?

   I’m assuming that with younger students, the data is probably pretty simple. What’s the nature of the data?

   One interesting use of Word tables was done by Robert Oakes, a high school teacher in Boston. He’s been creating assignment calendars in Word tables and wanted to continue using them.

   Each month was opened as a Word document in a high resolution screen, and a screen shot was taken of it. That produced a PNG file. He dragged each PNG file into the workBench drag and drop uploader - not into the image drop zones but into the”Other Files” drop zone on the far right. That produced an image that could be used in the workBench but that wasn’t compressed. The last part of the solution was that he dragged each file from his resource list into the Sitemap, not the Canvas, and linked to it. When you click on the link, the calendar comes up in its own window.

   Take a look. Go to the address below, click on English 10 on the bottom of the homepage, and then in the English 10 screen, on “Reading Calendars” in the menu on the left margin. Click on one of the months to see a Word table as an image in it’s own screen.

   http://www.accboston.org/roakes

   Most importantly, it sounds as if you’re embarking on a wonderful project, and I’d be very pleased to help as much as I can. A little more information will help steer me in the right direction.

   Ron

2. jbeam says September 14th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
   

   I think I want the kids (4th graders) to be able to add the data although I can do it if it is necessary. This project involves projecting how many seeds are in a pumpkin based on measurements that the kids will determine. ie height, weight, circumfrence. Each class will have 2 pumpkins that they will measure and then count seeds. Each class will give the other classes a digital picture of their pumpkins and the measurements they request. Then based on their experience with their own pumpkins, they will predicte how many seeds the other classes’ pumpkins have. We will also do some writing on how they decided what measurements to ask for and how they plan to determine how many seeds are in the other classes pumpkins. So I want to publish pictures and measurements and I want them to be able to blog about their experience. Maybe I just need a page for each of the 5 classes? I’m just not sure. What do you think Ron?

3. Ron says September 15th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
   

   Great project. Really a wonderful idea. Just off the top of my head, here are some ideas.

   I think you need a page per class to start in order to present the pumpkins. Each page would identify the class, show pictures of the pumpkins, perhaps thumbnails that linked to larger pictures, and give measurements and weight.

   I’m assuming that students then investigate their own pumpkins - cut them up and count the seeds. This seems like an important point for discussion within each class about any possible correlations that seem to exist between the measurements and the number of seeds for that class’s pumpkins. The students need to be able to talk this information through and to link it - their experiences with their two pumpkins - to the challenge of predicting seed counts for the other pumpkins. Pay more attention to the weight, circumference, height?

   You could use an actual blog for the discussions. However, the workBench might do too. For something short term like this, you could give the teachers in the different classrooms workBench accounts and pre-made discussion projects. They could copy and paste in student comments, or students could write in their comments one at a time in a big text box with their names at the top of their entries. Actually each class, supplied with partially completed pages, could fill in the details andput the information online.

   Students in each class could access and read their discussion online with its own web address, but they won’t have the other classes’ web addresses. This could be a private, internal discussion, shared later with all.

   Then all the predictions could be handed in and posted - perhaps on a single page. Then there could be more classroom discussion, as well as a general discussion open to all participants.

   The main website could share the web address for the earlier class discussions, and students could be assigned to read another class or twos initial discussions and compare and contrast it with their own class’s.

   Actually, there is just a lot of stuff here that kids could go back and investigate about what they and peers in other classes did and thought.

   I started playing around with a few screens - just for fun. I thought it might be fun if the students named their pumpkins. Then there would be an easy way to reference them all. Click on the pumpkin picture to see bigger versions. Click on the yellow triangles to advance. Let me know what you think. Ask any additional questions that come up!

   http://www.trintuition.com/gwaz3/pumpkin

   Ron

4. Candace Hackett Shively says September 16th, 2008 at 11:21 am
   

   Another approach to the blog option is to have each student create his/her own screen for comments, photos ( if you take them), and pumpkin naming, then LINK to each student’s individua umpkin page, creating a central Project Pumpkin “Patch” (home page with links out to student pages). That way students could work simultaneously writing individual posts about their pumpkins.

   Is Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater coming to your Project, too? Sorry–couldn’t resist!
   Candy